My first week here in Georgia, all of the CGA apprentices went on a journey together. They split us into groups of like 10 people. We drove just over the border to South Carolina where we began a hike. I didn’t really know what I was getting into on this hike. We had little information about it and I had no idea what to expect. So they dropped us off with our packs full of granola, quinoa, trail mix, and other supplies, prayed for us at the trail head, and sent us on our way. We really had no idea how far we were going… some of us heard rumors of it being 10 miles… but we weren’t entirely sure.
I’m not gonna lie, our trail was hard. The first day wasn’t so bad. We had to climb over some large trees that were fallen over the trail while balancing our pack and trying to make sure we didn’t fall down the mountain, but we did it. We hiked almost 4 miles on the first day. There were points that I thought my legs were going to give out and where I was getting cramps in my legs. I was exhausted. If you know me, you know that I don’t do things like hiking or running or distance walking even. I don’t enjoy it, I would rather do something like Zumba or ballet. Neither of which I have done in a very long time. So that first day just reminded me how out of shape I am. We stopped after a few hours that first night at a campsite right next to the Chattooga River. We found out that we were not using our own tents, but that we would be using tarps and having a community sleeping situation. We put up the tarps creating a lean-to type thing and claimed our spots with our sleeping pads. Most of us went to bed fairly early knowing that we would have at least a few hours of hiking ahead of us the next day, but we weren’t entirely sure how many miles it would be.
We woke up in the morning ate some granola and packed up camp. Right before we headed out we asked how far our leaders thought we had to get to our campsite for the rest of the week. They said probably somewhere around 7 miles. We knew it was going to be a rough and long day, but we had no idea what it would be like. It was rough. Within the first 45 minutes we had to stop for breaks like 2 or 3 times. The trail seemed like it was mostly up hill and there were moments when I seriously thought I could not go another step.
I cried.
It was an ugly cry.
I heard the words of my good friend Brittany in my head from a hike we took while on the Race, and she said “don’t make me get prophetic about how this hike is like your life right now.” The words were still so relevant.
I was scared. I was broken. I was hurting. I was exhausted. I had zero left of Amanda. ZERO.
But I hiked on, sometimes in tears…
We came across a sign shortly after we left our campsite the second morning that said a place near where we were going was actually 8.1 miles away instead of the 6-7 we thought… 8.1!! And where we were going was actually farther than that. The task wasn’t as daunting when we didn’t know the distance. But when we found out, there was some frustration and anger that we were going to have to go that far in one day. Our leaders debated and thought that we might not even be able to make it that far. That was the goal, but we weren’t going to try and sprint there. We were going to take our trail one step at a time (literally).
We did make it to our campsite that night, which ended up being about a mile from where we came out of the forest (where that 8.1 miles came out of the woods). When we got to our campsite that night, we celebrated by carb loading and eating a ton of mac and cheese. We set up our lean to tarp/tent situation, some of us took a short dip in the river… but it was freezing so we didn’t stay in long. We debriefed the hike, and went to sleep completely worn out. The next day we had 24 hours alone with Jesus. We took our tents and spent time reflecting the hike and praying into what this season will look like for us. [I also may have slept for a very long time on my alone day… my body was just so tired.]
The rest of our days in the woods were spent giggling and swapping stories from the race. A bunch of us girls decided to go bathe in the river (which I never actually did on the race) because we were pretty gross from the hike and the few days in the woods. We did not smell very good, that is for sure. We had some good worship time and some good conversation about what God is doing in our lives.
Our last morning, we hiked out to the bus, met up with the other hiking teams, and all had breakfast together. Although the hike was really, really hard and many times I was wishing I wasn’t there for it. Now I can say I hiked 13 miles. For some people hiking 13 miles isn’t a big deal, they would do that for fun, just because the could. But for me it is a huge deal. Not only was it big emotionally and physically, but spiritually too.
I plan to write a blog about the spiritual part of the hike within the next few days. I am excited to share it with you.
Much Love,
-A
